For supporters of non league & lower league football clubs this years FA Cup is already well underway.
Of course the Premier League & Championship teams do not enter until the Third Round. This years competition is now at the second round stage, but as you will see from our look at the FA Cup many teams have already played seven games to get to the second round stage!
We hope you enjoy our look at the FA Cup which comes in two parts.
The Football Association Challenge Cup, known worldwide as The FA Cup and for sponsorship reasons as The Emirates FA Cup, is an annual knockout cup competition in English football; it is the oldest association football competition in the world. The FA Cup is organised by and named after the Football Association. A concurrent women's tournament is also held, known as the FA Women's Cup.
The FA Cup was first held in 1871–72. Entry is open to all
teams who compete in the Premier League, the Football League and in Steps 1 to
5 of the FA National League System, as well as selected teams in Step 6. This
means that clubs of all standards compete, from the largest clubs in England
and Wales down to amateur village teams. The tournament has become known for
the possibility for "minnows" from the lower divisions to become
"giant-killers" by eliminating top clubs from the tournament and even
theoretically winning the Cup, although lower division teams rarely progress
beyond the early stages. The qualification rounds and a system of byes mean
that the very smallest and very biggest teams almost never meet.
Arsenal are the current holders, having beaten Aston Villa
4–0 in the 2015 final to win the cup for the second year in a row. It was their
12th FA Cup title overall, making Arsenal the FA Cup's most successful club
ahead of Manchester United on 11.
Format
The competition is a knockout tournament with pairings for
each round drawn at random. There are no seeds and the draw for each round is
not made until after the scheduled dates for the previous round . The draw also
determines which teams will play at home.
Each tie is played as a single leg. If a match is drawn,
there is a replay, usually at the ground of the team who were away for the
first game. Drawn replays are now settled with extra time and penalty
shootouts; until the 1990s further replays would be played until one team was
victorious. Some ties took as many as six matches to settle; in their 1975
campaign, Fulham played a total of 12 games over six rounds, which remains the
most games played by a team to reach a final. Replays were traditionally played
three or four days after the original game, but from 1991–92 they were staged
at least 10 days later on police advice. This led to penalty shoot-outs being
introduced, the first of which came on 26 November 1991 when Rotherham United
eliminated Scunthorpe United. Replays are no longer held for the semi-finals or
final.
There are a total of 14 rounds in the competition – six qualifying
rounds, followed by six "proper", plus the semi-finals and the final.
The qualifying rounds are regionalised to reduce the travel costs for smaller
non-league sides. The First and Second Rounds were also previously split into
Northern and Southern sections, but this practice was ended after the 1997–98
competition.
The competition begins in August with the lowest-ranked
clubs, contesting the Extra Preliminary Round, followed by the Preliminary
Round and First Qualifying Round . Clubs
in the Conference North and Conference South join in the Second Qualifying
Round, and Conference Premier clubs join in the Fourth Qualifying Round.
The 32 winners from that round progress to the First Round .
They are joined by the 48 clubs from League One and League Two. Finally, teams
from the Premier League and the Championship enter at the Third Round Proper,
at which point there are 64 teams remaining in the competition. The Sixth Round
Proper is the quarter-final stage, at which point eight teams remain.
The FA Cup has a set pattern for when each round is played.
Normally the First Round is played in mid-November, with the Second Round on
one of the first two Saturdays in December. The Third Round is played on the
first weekend in January, with the Fourth Round later in the month and Fifth
Round in mid-February. The Sixth Round
traditionally occurs in early or mid March, with the semi-finals a month
later.
The final is normally held the Saturday after the Premier
League season finishes in May. The only seasons in recent times when this
pattern was not followed were 1999–2000, when most rounds were played a few
weeks earlier than normal as an experiment, and 2010–11 and 2012–13 when the FA
Cup Final was played before the Premier League season had finished, to allow Wembley
Stadium to be ready for the UEFA Champions League final, as well as in 2011–12
to allow England time to prepare for that summer's European Championships.
Draw
The draw for each of the "proper" rounds is
unseeded and is broadcast live on television, usually taking place at the
conclusion of live coverage of one of the games of the previous round. No teams
are seeded in the qualifying round draws either, but the teams are grouped
geographically in the qualifying rounds to reduce travel costs. Public interest
is particularly high during the draw for the third round, which is where the
top-ranked teams are added to the draw.
Eligible teams
All clubs in the Premier League and Football League are
automatically eligible, and clubs in the next six levels of the English
football league system are also eligible provided they have played in either
the FA Cup, FA Trophy or FA Vase competitions in the previous season. Newly
formed clubs, such as F.C. United of Manchester in 2005–06 and also 2006–07,
may not therefore play in the FA Cup in their first season. All clubs entering
the competition must also have a suitable stadium.
It is very rare for top clubs to miss the competition,
although it can happen in exceptional circumstances. Defending holders
Manchester United did not enter the 1999–2000 FA Cup, as they were already in
the inaugural Club World Championship, with the club stating that entering both
tournaments would overload their fixture schedule and make it more difficult to
defend their Champions League and Premiership titles. The club claimed that
they did not want to devalue the FA Cup by fielding a weaker side. The move
benefited United as they received a two-week break and won the 1999–2000 league
title by an 18-point margin, although they did not progress past the group
stages of the Club World Cup. The withdrawal from the FA Cup, however, drew
considerable criticism as this weakened the tournament's prestige and Sir Alex
Ferguson later admitted his regret regarding their handling of the situation.
Welsh sides that play in English leagues are eligible,
although since the creation of the League of Wales there are only six clubs
remaining: Cardiff City, Swansea City, Newport County, Wrexham, Merthyr Town
and Colwyn Bay. In the early years other teams from Wales, Ireland and Scotland
also took part in the competition, with Glasgow side Queen's Park losing the
final to Blackburn Rovers in 1884 and 1885 before being barred from entering by
the Scottish Football Association. In the 2013–14 season the first Channel
Island club entered the competition when Guernsey F.C. competed for the first
time.
The number of entrants has increased greatly in recent
years. In the 2004–05 season, 660 clubs entered the competition, beating the
long-standing record of 656 from the 1921–22 season. In 2005–06 this increased
to 674 entrants, in 2006–07 to 687, in 2007–08 to 731 clubs, and for the
2008–09 and 2009–10 competitions it reached 762. The number has varied slightly
but remained roughly stable since then, with 759 clubs participating in
2010–11, a record 763 in 2011–12, 758 for 2012–13, 737 for 2013–14 and 736 for
2014–15. By comparison, the other major English domestic cup, the League Cup,
involves only the 92 members of the Premier League and Football League.
European qualification
The FA Cup winners qualify for the following season's UEFA
Europa League . This European place applies even if the team is relegated or is
not in the English top flight. In the past, if the FA Cup winning team also
qualified for the following season's Champions League or Europa League through
their league position, then the losing FA Cup finalist was given the Europa
League place instead. FA Cup winners enter the Europa League at the Group
Stage. Losing finalists, if they entered the Europa League, began earlier, at
the play-off or third qualifying round stage. From the 2015–16 UEFA Europa
League season, however, UEFA will not allow the runners-up to qualify for the
Europa League through the competition.
The FA Cup winners also qualify for the single-match FA
Community Shield against the Premier League champions.
Venues
Matches in the FA Cup are usually played at the home ground
of one of the two teams. The team who plays at home is decided when the matches
are drawn. There is no seeding system in place within rounds other than when
teams enter the competition, therefore the home team is simply the first team
drawn out for each fixture. Occasionally games may have to be moved to other
grounds due to other events taking place, security reasons or a ground not
being suitable to host popular teams. In the event of a draw, the replay is
played at the ground of the team who originally played away from home, with
extra time and a penalty shoot-out deciding the winner if the replay game also
ends in a tie.
In the days when multiple replays were possible, the second
replay were played at neutral grounds.
The clubs involved could alternatively agree to toss for home advantage in the
second replay.
Traditionally, the FA Cup Final is played at London's Wembley
Stadium, however due to extensive redevelopment of Wembley, finals between 2001
and 2006 were played at Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. The final returned to
Wembley in May 2007. The Early Cup finals were held predominantly at Kennington
Oval in 1872 and from 1874 to 1892; and Crystal Palace from 1895 to 1914. Other
early venues include the Racecourse Ground in Derby in 1886; Fallowfield
Stadium in Manchester in 1893; Goodison Park in Liverpool in 1894; Burnden Park
in Bolton for the 1901 replay; Bramall Lane in Sheffield in 1912 replay;
Stamford Bridge from 1920 to 1922; and Lillie Bridge in Fulham, London, in
1873. In more recent times, the memorable 1970 final replay between Leeds and
Chelsea was held at Old Trafford in Manchester. This was the only time between
1923 and 2000 that the FA Cup final or the FA Cup Final replay was held at a
stadium other than Wembley.
The semi-finals were traditionally contested at
high-capacity neutral venues; usually the home grounds of teams not involved in
that semi-final. It was common for these venues to be roughly equidistant
between the two teams for fairness of travel. Venues used since 1990 include
Manchester City's now demolished Maine Road stadium, Manchester United's Old
Trafford Stadium, Sheffield Wednesday's Hillsborough stadium, Arsenal's former
home, Highbury, London's Wembley Stadium, the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff,
and Aston Villa's Villa Park in Birmingham. Villa Park is the most used
stadium, with 55 semi-finals. The 1991 semi-final between Arsenal and Tottenham
was the first to be played at Wembley, as were both 1993, 1994 and 2000
semi-finals. In 2005, both were held at the Millennium Stadium. The decision to
hold the semi-finals at the same location as the final can be controversial
amongst fans However, starting with the 2008 cup, all semi-finals are played at
Wembley; the stadium was not ready for the 2007 semi-finals. For a list of
semi-final results and the venues used, see FA Cup Semi-finals.
Trophies
At the end of the final, the winning team is presented with
a trophy, known as the "FA Cup", which they hold until the following
year's final. Traditionally, at Wembley finals, the presentation is made at the
Royal Box, with players, led by the captain, mounting a staircase to a gangway
in front of the box and returning by a second staircase on the other side of
the box. At Cardiff the presentation was made on a podium on the pitch.
The present FA Cup trophy is the fifth. The first, the
'little tin idol', was made by Martin, Hall & Co at a cost of £20 and used
from the inception of the Cup in 1871–72 until it was stolen from a Birmingham
shoe shop window belonging to William Shillcock while held by Aston Villa on 11
September 1895 and was never seen again. The FA fined Villa £25 to pay for a replacement.
Almost 60 years later, Harry Burge admitted that the cup had been melted down
to make counterfeit half-crown coins. However, Birmingham detectives noticed
discrepancies between Burge's account and the event. Burge stated that he broke
into the back of the shop with two others, and even posed for a photo showing
how he did this, yet a report at the time in the Birmingham Post described how
the robbers had actually broken through the roof of the shop.
The second trophy was a replica of the first and was last
used in 1910 before being presented to the FA's long-serving president Lord
Kinnaird. It was sold at Christie's on 19 May 2005 for £420,000 to David Gold, the then joint chairman of
Birmingham City. Gold has loaned this trophy to the National Football Museum
for public display, although in November 2012, it was ceremonially
"presented" to Royal Engineers, after they beat Wanderers 7-1 in a
replay of the first FA Cup final.
A third, larger, trophy was bought by the FA in 1911
designed and manufactured by Fattorini's of Bradford and won by Bradford City
in its first outing. This trophy still exists but is now too fragile to be
used, so an exact replica was made by Toye, Kenning and Spencer and has been in
use since the 1992 final. A "backup" trophy was made alongside the
existing trophy in 1992, but it has not been used so far, and will only be used
if the current trophy is lost, damaged or destroyed. A smaller, but otherwise
identical replica was also made by Fattorini, the North Wales Coast FA Cup
trophy, and is contested annually by members of that regional Association.
The latest trophy, handcrafted by trophy makers Thomas Lyte
to replicate the 1911 trophy, was introduced for the 2014 FA Cup Final to
replace the 1992 trophy, which had shown wear and tear as it had been used and
presented more than in previous eras, when it usually remained in the winning
team's trophy cabinets for the most part. The 2014 trophy was built heavier,
at, than the previous versions to withstand the increased use.
To be continued,
Part Two Coming Soon.
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